Tajik State News Agency Takes On IS In 'Information War'

Tajikistan's official news agency, Khovar, has launched an "information war" against Islamic State (IS), pushing back against the group's propaganda by publishing reports about its gory killings, enslavement of women, and other abuses.

The most well-known of Tajikistan's IS recruits is Gulmurod Halimov, the head of the Interior Ministry special forces (OMON), whose defection to IS in May caused a media storm, though his move should be seen as "unlikely to be representative of the general state of affairs" in the country, according to John Heathershaw, a political scientist who studies Islamic militancy in Tajikistan.

Tajikistan's "information war" reflects the country's fears that Islamic State is using the Internet and particularly social media to radicalize and recruit citizens.

IS disseminates gory videos on the Internet in order to attract "uneducated youth," said Khudoyberdi Kholiknazar, the head of the Center for Strategic Studies under the President of Tajikistan.

"By showing the true face of the extremists, we are waging an information war against them," Kholiknazar told Radio Ozodi. "We also need to make young people understand that this is a senseless fight and that joining it is meaningless."

Khovar director Kosimi agrees that it is Tajikistan's youth who need to be made to see the reality of IS.

While the older generation is "well aware of the consequences of destabilization," he said, the younger generation is not.

As well as ramping up anti-IS reports on state media, Tajikistan has attempted to stifle IS propaganda by blocking websites relating to 16 groups it says are extremist, including IS.

While Tajikistan wages its "information war," IS has stepped up its own Russian-language propaganda efforts in an attempt to recruit more militants from the former Soviet Union.

The group has launched a new Russian-language media wing, Furat Media and evidence suggests it is involving Central Asian militants in its efforts, with a prominent Tajik militant, Abu Daoud (Parviz Saidrakhmonov) photographed in an IS "media center."

And Russian-speaking IS militants maintain easily-accessible and often public accounts on social media platforms including VKontakte and Odnoklassniki, where they disseminate propaganda and talk about their experiences.